The goal of this grant competition is to provide funds to improve the quality of civic and government education, and economic education in the United States,
to foster competence and responsibility, and to improve the quality of civic education and economic education through programs and activities with emerging democracies. The funds will be used to create and implement programs and interventions in civic and government education or economic education for teachers and students in elementary and secondary classrooms.

This grant competition is open to organizations in the United States experienced in the development of curricula and programs in civic and government education, or economic education for students and teachers in elementary and secondary schools in countries other than the United States, to carry out civic education or economic education activities.

Waivers for individual applications failing to meet the deadline will not be granted, regardless of the circumstances. Under very extraordinary circumstances the Department may change the closing date for a grant competition. When this occurs, the Department announces such a change in a notice published in the Federal Register.

No. The FY 2010 Cooperative Civic Education and Economic Education Exchange Program does not have a mandatory electronic submission.
Please Note: You may not submit your application by e-mail or facsimile

To submit an application electronically, please use the Department of Education’s Electronic Grant Application System (e-Application) accessible through the Department’s e-Grants Web site at http://e-grants.ed.gov. Instructions on electronic submission can be found in this application package. Please follow the instructions carefully

Applicants using the Department of Education’s e-Application system will need to register first to access an application package. Forms in an application package are completed on-line and narratives are uploaded while logged into the system. Therefore, allow sufficient time to complete your application before the closing date. If you have not used e-Application in the past, you may want to walk through the Demonstration available on the e-Application homepage. If you encounter difficulties, you may also contact the e-Grants help desk on 1-888-336-8930.

8. Other than the normal hours of operation that the system is unavailable for maintenance (See Federal Register notice for regularly scheduled maintenance times), is there any other time the system will be unavailable prior to the application deadline date?

If you are submitting your application electronically, the Department of Education’s e-Grants Web site will be unavailable from February 10-15, 2010 because of upgrades to our system. This means that you will not be able to work on-line to complete your forms or upload your narrative sections and submit your final application electronically to the Department during this time. You will have to wait until the system is available again on February 16, 2010 to do so. Our recommendation is that you download a copy of the application before February 10, 2010 so you will have the information you need to work on developing your narrative sections while the system is unavailable. We will not grant an extension to the submission deadline because of the system unavailability during February 10-15, 2010.

10. What is required if my State Single Point of Contact indicates that they are not reviewing application for this grant competition?

You should include a copy of such a response from the State Single Point of Contact in the application package submitted to the U.S. Department of Education and check the appropriate line on the SF 424 form.

12. If you submit an application electronically, are there any compatibility restrictions, especially if Microsoft Vista is used?

You must submit your application in a .DOC (document), .RTF (rich text), .PDF (Portable document) format in order for your application to submit successfully to the Department. If you submit your application in any other format, we will not be able to access your document. Also, note, if you are using the Microsoft Word from the Vista Operating System, you will need to convert your document from a .DOCX to a .DOC file before you can submit.

13. If an application is submitted electronically, are there any restrictions on the file name length or size of the document?

No, e-Application does not have a restriction on the number of characters in a file name or the size of a file being uploaded into the system. However, in the past, we have encountered problems opening files that had large names or were extremely large documents, especially those that had quite a number of graphics embedded in the document. We suggest you limit these so that the Department will not have any problems accessing the attachments you submit.

14. If I am submitting my application electronically, how should I submit forms with signatures?If you are submitting an electronic application, you may either upload signed versions of the forms, in a .PDF format, to the Appendices section of e-Application or you may fax the signed forms to the Department of Education. These documents may be faxed to (202) 485-0013, to the attention of Rita Foy Moss and must be received within three days of your application submission.TOP

15. What are the project and budget periods for these grants?

The project period is 36 months. Projects will be funded for one year with an option for each additional year, contingent upon substantial progress by the grantee and the availability of funds. A budget should be submitted for each year. We intend the project and budget periods for projects funded under this grant competition to be July 1, 2010 - June 30, 2013.

No. For this grant competition, you may charge indirect costs using the rate negotiated with your cognizant federal agency (e.g., Department of Education, Department of Health and Human Services, or Department of the Interior) or State education agency. Grantees are not required to charge the grant for indirect costs. If grantees wish to charge indirect costs, they must provide proof of the approved rate with the grant application.

If you claim indirect costs in the budget for your proposed project and do not have a negotiated rate with the federal government, you have 90 days from the time you transmit your application to submit the necessary paperwork to the Department to receive a negotiated indirect cost rate. For more information about indirect cost rates, please visit www.ed.gov/about/offices/list/ocfo/intro.html.

21. Are there guidelines for how much money can be spent on consultants? What is the daily limit and is there a cap?

There is no daily limit or cap for consultant fees. However, all costs charged to a grant, including consultant fees, should be, as provided for in the OMB Cost Circulars, reasonable. Information related to these fees should be included on ED Form 524 under the Contractual budget category. Also, applicants should be sure to fully substantiate all expenditures in the budget narrative.

22. Does my application have to address both absolute priorities and the invitational priority?

This competition includes two absolute priorities and one invitational priority. To be considered for funding, each applicant must address one absolute priority and the activities specified under that priority. We do not give an application that meets the invitational priority a competitive or absolute preference over other applications. The Secretary is particularly interested in projects that use pre- and post-intervention testing, or more rigorous methods to measure the effects of this program on the knowledge and skills of students and the classroom practice (s) of participating teachers.

The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) provides that any person has the right to request access to federal agency records or information. All U.S. Government agencies are required to disclose records upon receiving a written request for them, except for those records that are protected from disclosure by the nine exemptions listed in the FOIA. All applications submitted for funding consideration under this grant competition are subject to the FOIA. To read the text of the Freedom of Information Act, visit http://www.justice.gov/oip/04_3.html